Contemporary Arts

Guerra de la Paz

Formed in 1996, based in Miami, Florida (USA).

Guerra de la Paz is the composite name representing the creative team efforts since 1996 of the artists Alain Guerra (born in Havana, Cuba in 1968) and Neraldo de la Paz (born in Mantanzas, Cuba in 1955) both of whom received education in fine art in the USA. Their work has been exhibited throughout the USA and Europe and at a number of Asian art fairs, and they have received many awards, fellowships, residencies and commissions. They are based in Little Haiti, Miami, close to the 'pepe' businesses (used items exported to Haiti). These businesses produce abundant discarded clothing destined for landfill, adopted by the artists as their main raw material. The creative re-use of materials is as old as art history, but since 'clothes make the man', discarded clothing is peculiarly rich in human energy and metaphor, with an inbuilt capacity to address universal concerns - consumption, environmental issues, the individual and the collective, corporate morality, social power etc. While sometimes viewed inside the USA as an ethnically defined 'Cuban collective', outside its borders GDLP's art sits easily within a global play of signs defined by world issues. The artists see their practice as a reflective and radical 'archaeology', and their immersive installations tend to be witty, theatrical and clearly delineated: the meanings may be less clear, encapsulating as they do the contradictions of contemporary life.

  《Follow the Leader》2011
courtesy of the artists
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